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| ECE turns 50 – kicking off the anniversary year  On January 22, 1965, mail order pioneer Werner Otto founded ECE – he initially aimed to prevent real estate issues interfering with the thriving Otto Versand. At the end of the 1960s, Otto brought the modern shopping center concept from the U.S. to Germany. Under the name "Einkaufs-Center-Entwicklungsgesellschaft" ("Shopping Center Development Company"), the new company first opened Franken-Center in Nuremberg in 1969 and Alstertal-Einkaufszentrum in Hamburg in 1970.Therefore, ECE's history is closely connected with the history of shopping centers in Germany as a whole – both have been a success story for 50 years. By extending its business fields to office properties, company headquarters, logistics centers, railway stations, and hotels, the name did not cover the company's activities to their entirety and was therefore changed to the name under which the independent and autonomous sister company of Otto Group is known today: ECE Projektmanagement G.m.b.H. & Co. KG. As a result, the company's headquarters in the Hamburg district of Poppenbüttel grew larger continuously. More than 3, 500 people work for ECE across Europe, 1,300 of them in Hamburg alone. Alexander Otto, the youngest son of founder Werner Otto, took over the helm at ECE in the year 2000. Alexander Otto promoted the international expansion of the company, multiplied the number of managed shopping centers and tapped new business fields for ECE. write your comments about the article :: © 2015 Construction News :: home page |